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For much of the nineteenth century, British painting was a powerful stimulus to artists throughout Europe. In no area was Britain more influential than landscape painting. The lively brushwork, sparkling light, and realistic detail found in John Constable's scenes of the English countryside—which caused a sensation at the Paris Salon of 1824—spurred artists to depict their native scenery with new directness. J. M. W. Turner's dramatic, sometimes nearly abstract, evocations of sea, air, and sky, inspired painters as diverse as Eugène Delacroix and Claude Monet to portray the fleeting effects of nature in their work. A similar vigor and candor animates British figure painting of the period, which is often rooted in contemporary life.

This gallery is one of ten that comprise the Henry J. Heinz II Galleries.